Haard met blad- en bloemmotieven 1772 - 1779

Jean-Baptiste Bichard made this print of a fireplace with leaf and flower motifs. It's likely from the mid-18th century in France, judging by the inscription "Cheminée à la Moderne." In its time, a print like this was less a work of art than a commodity. Prints were part of a burgeoning visual culture, as the graphic arts took on a more public role. They mediated design ideas from elite circles to a wider audience. The fireplace design reflects the prevailing taste for neoclassicism in the decorative arts, an aesthetic closely tied to wealth and power. To understand prints like this, it's important to know the social function they served in disseminating style and taste, and the institutions like the French Royal Academy that codified those values. We can use period trade publications and design books to reconstruct how they were used. The meaning of an image like this is contingent on the social and institutional context in which it was made and consumed.